Few cases ever excited greater interest than that of Eliza Fenning; and we are happy in being able to state that her religious principles were correct, and her professions sincere. Through life she was distinguished by a superiority of intellect, and a propriety of deportment, which could hardly be reconciled with the depravity of which she was accused. In person she was short of stature, but of the most perfect symmetry; while her countenance evinced a heart at ease, and a mind at once intellectual and lively. She had been before the fatal transaction betrothed to a young man, to whom she appears to have been sincerely attached.
After the unfortunate girl’s conviction she was induced to apply to the Crown for a remission of the sentence of death, and sent a petition to the prince regent. She next addressed the lord chancellor, to whom she sent a statement of all the exculpatory circumstances of her case. She also sent a letter to Lord Sidmouth, and another to her late master, requesting him to sign a petition in her favour, with which however he refused to comply.
Several gentlemen interested themselves in the fate of the poor girl; and Mr. Montagu, of Lincoln’s Inn, waited on the recorder, offering to produce evidence of a member of Mr. Turner’s family, who was insane, having declared that he would poison the family; but the recorder assured him that the production of such evidence would be wholly useless.
The night before her execution a meeting of gentlemen took place in Mr. Newman’s apartments in Newgate, at which Mr. Gibson, of the house of Corbyn and Co., chemists, No. 300, Holborn, stated that Robert Gregson Turner, in the month of September or October, called at their house in a wild and deranged state, requesting to be put under restraint, otherwise he declared he should destroy himself and wife. Mr. Gibson also stated that it was well known in the family that Robert Turner was occasionally subject to such violent and strange conduct.
With this information Mr. Gibson, accompanied by a clerk from the secretary of state’s office, waited on the recorder, requesting that the unfortunate girl might be respited to admit of investigation; but all was of no avail, and in twelve hours after, Eliza Fenning was executed!
From the moment the poor girl was first charged with the poisoning, however or by whomsoever questioned, she never faltered in her denial of the crime, and rather courted than shunned an investigation of her case. So many circumstances, which had developed themselves subsequently to the trial, had been communicated to the secretary of state by the gentlemen who interested themselves in her favour (among whom were some of great respectability), that a reprieve was confidently expected to the last: and the order for her execution, four months after her conviction, was received with very great surprise.
On Tuesday morning, the 25th July, she took her last farewell of her father, who, by the firmness of his manner, exemplified the courage he wished his child to sustain upon the scaffold: but with her mother the parting scene was heart-rending.
On the fatal morning, the 26th July, 1815, she slept till four o’clock, when she arose, and, after carefully washing herself, and spending some time in prayer, she dressed herself neatly in a white muslin gown and cap. About eight o’clock she walked steadily to the spot where criminals are bound; and, whilst the executioner tied her hands—even whilst he wound the halter round her waist—she stood erect and unmoved, with astonishing fortitude. At this moment a gentleman who had greatly interested himself in her behalf adjured her, in the name of that God in whose presence she was about to appear, if she knew anything of the crime for which she was about to suffer, to make it known; when she replied distinctly and clearly, “Before God then, I die innocent!” The question was again put by the reverend Mr. Vazie, as well as by the ordinary, and finally, by Oldfield, a prisoner who suffered with her, and to each she repeated “I am innocent.” These were her last words; and she died without a struggle, at the age of twenty-one.
Her miserable parents, on application for her body, were not prepared to pay the executioner’s fees of fourteen shillings and sixpence: but having borrowed the money with some difficulty, the remains of their daughter were handed over to them.
We have endeavoured to give the circumstances of this case as clearly and with as little prejudice as possible, but we should not do our duty, if we were not to state that the public mind was much inflamed at the execution of the unhappy prisoner. Thousands of persons, after examining the evidence adduced at the trial, did not hesitate to express their opinions very strongly upon the subject of the case; and many of the lower orders, apparently convinced of the innocence of the sufferer, assembled in front of Mr. Turner’s house, in Chancery-lane, hooting and hissing, and otherwise expressing their indignation, at what they conceived to be their unjust prosecution of their servant. The police were active in their exertions to suppress the tumult; and an affidavit made by Davis, a turnkey in Newgate, was industriously circulated, in which the deponent swore that old Fenning had conjured his daughter, when she went upon the scaffold, to declare her innocence: a counter affidavit of the father of the wretched girl, however, was produced and published, and the assertion of the jailer was at length admitted to have been founded upon a mistaken interpretation of what had really passed. The mob continued to assemble for many days, and it was not until the police had taken very vigorous measures against them, that they were finally dispersed. The public still sympathised with the unhappy parents of Eliza Fenning, and a subscription was entered into for their benefit.